colin kaepernick

All of the NFC North teams are now tied for first place within the division.

The San Francisco 49ers decisive Saturday Night whooping of the Packers ended any hope (or fear) of a team from the North winning the Super Bowl.

While Vikings fans have to be elated to see their most hated enemy’s Super Bowl hopes dashed, it is somewhat painful to notice exactly how the 49ers took away a Victory.

Quarterback Colin Kaepernick was selected with the fourth pick of the second round of the 2011 NFL Draft. This was nearly a full round later than where the Vikings decided to place the future of the quarterback position on the shoulders of Christian Ponder.

I’m not going to launch into a hate fest of Ponder, but it is hard to deny that Kaepernick is clearly the better quarterback right now and that he has progressed faster than Ponder. He is just plain and simply getting it done both through the air and on the ground.

What hurts even more is that Kaepernick led an option style offense that posted a ridiculous 579 yards against Green Bay’s defense. The Vikings employed a similar scheme in the Wild Card round’s opening drive, with Joe Webb making the surprise start, but inexplicably abandoned the option after finding success on that drive.

Why Bill Musgrave and Leslie Frazier “adjusted” their offensive scheme after that first drive will be a question that, for most fans, will never be adequately answered.

Soon, why the Vikings opted for Ponder over Kaepernick in the 2011 NFL Draft may be a question that Rick Spielman finds equally difficult to answer.